Clear the snow and ice off your car before driving or you might kill someone

The east coast of North America is getting blasted with frigid arctic weather this week, and it's colder than normal throughout most of the continent. Before driving this winter, there's something you should do that could save lives:

Clear all the snow and ice off your car before getting on the road.

People think of snow as fluffy and soft, and they assume ice will just melt away, but when a giant chunk of snow or ice flies off your car and hits someone else who's doing 60mph on the freeway, or even just causes them to swerve, the result can be deadly. And in many US states, driving with snow or ice on your car is illegal!

On Christmas day, @Felicity and I were driving home from visiting family and we encountered dozens of cars and trucks on the road that were covered in snow and ice. At one point a huge chunk of ice flew off a pickup truck in front of us, broke into two chunks in the air, and would have creamed us if I hadn't managed to swerve between the chunks. And that wasn't the only ice bomb we had to dodge that day. I'm glad we were luckier than the driver in this photo.

Please think of your fellow drivers (and pedestrians) before you drive this winter. Icy roads are dangerous enough without having to dodge flying ice bombs!

Ugh, I can't even laugh at that. I'm just imagining this idiot turning a corner and dumping hundreds of pounds of snow onto a pedestrian or another car and seriously hurting someone. It makes me angry. 😠